Beginner’s Guide to Compiling and Decompiling APKs

Over the last several months, we at XDA have been on kind of a teachingbinge. By bringing a number of tutorials to the front page, we hope to help point budding developers to tools and resources that may help in future projects and ultimately result in more development work shared with the community. As the old adage goes: the more the merrier, right? Now, there’s an updated tutorial on the basic compiling and decompiling of APK files.

Written by XDA Forum Member aguha1044, the guide is very simple to follow. It is written for Windows users, which is a little different as most guides require Linux in some form or another. In order to follow it, users will need 7zip, APKTool, and Java installed on their computer. It also requires some familiarity with command line interfaces.

Once the pre-requisites have been met, users will be run through the process of decompiling and recompiling an APK. It doesn’t show how to actually modify the APKs, but that’s a project for other tutorials. In addition to the basics, aguha1044 has also posted some workarounds to common problems to ensure the APKs actually work afterward.

XDA Developers was founded by developers, for developers. It is now a valuable resource for people who want to make the most of their mobile devices, from customizing the look and feel to adding new functionality.Are you a developer? | Terms of Service